Hood and Lundquist? Mission accomplished. And grown-ups with fledgling spies? Add some secret-agent supplies to your...
In a clever take on the back-to-school theme, Hood presents the first day of school as a secret agent’s mission, with steps to complete.
“Your mission? To begin the first phase of training in your hunt for intelligence.” Step No.1 is to suit up. The story follows multiple kids. There’s one searching the laundry for a favorite shirt, another who lost a shoe, and still another who wears every favorite piece of clothing at once—tiara, tutu, cowboy boots. Step 2: rendezvous at vehicle checkpoint. This includes those who are walking, biking, or getting to school by bus or car. The intelligence officer (teacher) hands out IDs (nametags), and then agents must build diplomatic relations (say hello in seven different languages, including Robot) and get debriefed (circle time). From subjects studied and school rules to the basic schedule and a mishap (an escaped class pet), the 19 steps pretty much cover it all, albeit in wonderful tongue-in-cheek secret-agent language that kids will really enjoy. Lundquist’s artwork does the heavy lifting, as there is no text other than the steps and a few speech bubbles. The watercolor illustrations feature diverse children, a white male teacher, and even a set of twins (one wears glasses)—aka double agents. This will not only calm new students’ fears, but give them a unique way to look at their own first days of school.
Hood and Lundquist? Mission accomplished. And grown-ups with fledgling spies? Add some secret-agent supplies to your shopping lists. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: July 12, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-385-38471-1
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Random House
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of...
Rabe follows a young girl through her first 12 days of kindergarten in this book based on the familiar Christmas carol.
The typical firsts of school are here: riding the bus, making friends, sliding on the playground slide, counting, sorting shapes, laughing at lunch, painting, singing, reading, running, jumping rope, and going on a field trip. While the days are given ordinal numbers, the song skips the cardinal numbers in the verses, and the rhythm is sometimes off: “On the second day of kindergarten / I thought it was so cool / making lots of friends / and riding the bus to my school!” The narrator is a white brunette who wears either a tunic or a dress each day, making her pretty easy to differentiate from her classmates, a nice mix in terms of race; two students even sport glasses. The children in the ink, paint, and collage digital spreads show a variety of emotions, but most are happy to be at school, and the surroundings will be familiar to those who have made an orientation visit to their own schools.
While this is a fairly bland treatment compared to Deborah Lee Rose and Carey Armstrong-Ellis’ The Twelve Days of Kindergarten (2003), it basically gets the job done. (Picture book. 4-7)Pub Date: June 21, 2016
ISBN: 978-0-06-234834-0
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Harper/HarperCollins
Review Posted Online: May 3, 2016
Kirkus Reviews Issue: June 1, 2016
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
BOOK REVIEW
As insubstantial as hot air.
A diverse cast of children first makes a fleet of hot air balloons and then takes to the sky in them.
Lifestyle maven Gaines uses this activity as a platform to celebrate diversity in learning and working styles. Some people like to work together; others prefer a solo process. Some take pains to plan extensively; others know exactly what they want and jump right in. Some apply science; others demonstrate artistic prowess. But “see how beautiful it can be when / our differences share the same sky?” Double-page spreads leading up to this moment of liftoff are laid out such that rhyming abcb quatrains typically contain one or two opposing concepts: “Some of us are teachers / and share what we know. / But all of us are learners. / Together is how we grow!” In the accompanying illustration, a bespectacled, Asian-presenting child at a blackboard lectures the other children on “balloon safety.” Gaines’ text has the ring of sincerity, but the sentiment is hardly an original one, and her verse frequently sacrifices scansion for rhyme. Sometimes it abandons both: “We may not look / or work or think the same, / but we all have an / important part to play.” Swaney’s delicate, pastel-hued illustrations do little to expand on the text, but they are pretty. (This book was reviewed digitally with 11.2-by-18.6-inch double-page spreads viewed at 70.7% of actual size.)
As insubstantial as hot air. (Picture book. 4-8)Pub Date: Nov. 10, 2020
ISBN: 978-1-4003-1423-2
Page Count: 32
Publisher: Tommy Nelson
Review Posted Online: Jan. 18, 2021
BOOK REVIEW
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